More and more chilling stories are flowing from Yvonne Nelson’s book, as the part that highlights her encounter with a certain powerful Nigerian politician has gripped the minds of readers.
Asides from the mixed reactions her sexual escapades and issues pertaining to her identity have generated on social media, there is an aspect in her book that captures her escape from what could have been a disastrous end to her career.
Yvonne, detailed in her book, some scary events that played out during her stay in Nigeria.
She recounted an instance when a friend scheduled a meeting between her and a certain politician at the popular Eko Hotel and Suites in Lagos, only for the said man to request her blood sample for a supposed HIV test.
“An actress friend told me her uncle wanted to meet me. I told her I had a long day and wouldn’t close early, but she had all the patience in the world for me that day. She came and parked her Range Rover and waited until I finished shooting after 11 p.m. Nigeria was scary and driving that late at night was a risk, but she made it sound as though we were going for an important business gig, so I obliged.
"She picked me up and it was midnight when we got to the Eko Hotel, where the supposed uncle was. The said uncle of my friend was in the luxurious Signature Suite. She introduced him to me as a popular governor or senator of one of the states in Nigeria.
"She then went to the lounge of the suite and left me with him in the room. There was no chair in the room, something that seemed deliberate. I sat on the edge of the bed and the most awkward silence I can remember in my life ensued. He, perhaps, had the impression that I knew what to do or say, which I found ridiculous.
“That wasn’t all there was to the drama. There was a fourth person in the lounge. The politician went to speak briefly to him and came back to tell me the man was his doctor, and that I should give him my blood sample for an HIV test. He said it was just a prick and that everything would be done in a short time,” she established.
Yvonne Nelson said she found such an act disrespectful and declined the request, but it resulted in her receiving a smaller amount (some dirty naira notes) as compared to what she might have earned if she had obliged.
“I found it disrespectful and shocking. Even if I wanted to sleep with him, that alone was enough to put any normal woman off. If he was interested in knowing my HIV status, why did he think I would not be interested in his? I told him that was not the reason I came there and that I wasn’t going to do any test.
"I was calm but firm, though afraid. There were two men and two women in the suite, but the other woman was on the side of the two men, so I was alone. If things got out of hand, I was going to be on my own. I later found out that the man was not her uncle as she had claimed, but she knew why he wanted to see me."
She continued, “When he realized he wasn’t going to have his way, he muttered something to my friend to the effect that I was acting weird. Soon, we were on our way out of the hotel. For our 'transportation' back home, he gave my friend some dirty Naira notes he had produced from the briefcase that lay on the bed in the room. It was 1 million Naira and my friend gave me half of it."
Yvonne further narrated how she embarked on investigations and chanced on pictures of the said man with popular female stars splashed on the internet.
“When I later googled his name and saw his photographs and association with a number of female actors and celebrities, I wondered what happened before or after those photographs,” the actress noted.
Coincidentally, years later, Yvonne said she had a discussion with a friend who complained about a man who offered him a contract based on the condition that he joins his cult and that man happened to be the exact person who requested Yvonne’s blood sample at the hotel.
“Years later, my curiosity about the politician I had met in the hotel was piqued when a Nigerian friend in Ghana told me he had gone to him for a contract but failed to secure it. In the discussion, he revealed that the politician belonged to a cult and had insisted that joining that cult was a prerequisite to doing business with my friend.
"My friend said he couldn’t join, so he cut all ties with him. I have since been thinking about whether the blood sample he wanted to take of me was actually for an HIV test or for something that had to do with his occult business,” parts of the book read.
However, Yvonne Nelson’s book has since sparked various discussions on social media amidst commiserations for all the difficult events she had been through.
A section of social media had also condemned her decision to publish the book in which some well-respected personalities had been indicted.
Ghanaian Actress, Yvonne Nelson